News: Anyone wishing to register as a new member on the forum is strongly recommended to use a "proper" email address - following recent spam/hack attempts on the forum, all security is set to "high", and "disposable" email addresses like Gmail, Yahoo and Hotmail tend to be viewed with suspicion, and the application rejected if there is any doubt whatsoever

I've not heard of this before, but it is obviously well-established where it is needed. See under "The coolest tech: Ice storage" almost at the bottom of the page (and some interesting final comments about different energy storage options):

Ice Energy and CALMAC provide thermal storage at the opposite end of the temperature spectrum from solar power plant developers.

Both companies are leaders in shifting the energy used to cool buildings from when the day is hottest, demand on the grid is highest, and electricity is most expensive, to the cooler night when demand is low and abundant, wind-generated electricity can be bought from most grid systems at very low prices.

Both companies’ devices attach to building air conditioning (A/C) units. They freeze water at night so when cooling is needed the next day, the draw from the A/C is sharply reduced.

CALMAC’s business model focuses on building owners, winning customers by simply cutting their electricity bills. The technology can have a huge impact, especially where high demand charges from peaking A/C use can be controlled.

Ice Energy partners with utilities. Though already widely used across the U.S., its Ice Bear product got its biggest recognition yet by winning 16 contracts for 26 MW of distributed and behind-the-meter storage in the Southern California Edison (SCE) 2014 local capacity requirement (LCR) bidding.

By allowing the utility to control if and when the Ice Bear is used, the technology acts as a demand response resource, Higgins said. SCE expects to eventually be able to cut its peak load, when necessary, by 95% of the contracted 26 MW with the flip of a control switch, according to Ice Energy.

Building cooling is unaffected, but if SCE throws the switch, the cooling would be coming from wind energy-generated power, which helps the utility meet its renewables mandate. That electricity would also be lower priced.

BWP, Glendale Water & Power, Redding Electric Utility, and Riverside Public Utilities also employ the Ice Energy technology, according to Energy Storage Update.

Ice Energy’s business is expanding quickly, reported Chief Information Officer Chris B. Tillotson. It already has 12MW installed and 30MW contracted for and it is working on a development pipeline of over 100 MW. It is also readying an Ice Cub residential product, which should hit the market in time to be an early player in the aggregated distributed energy resources markets being developed in California and New York.

The best tech depends on location

“We believe this is the only non-battery distributed storage technology,” Tillotson said, taking the cooling technology out of competition with the bulk providers.

For all the gravity-driven bulk storage technologies, Higgins said, “the question is whether the final engineering costs make it cost-effective.”

“We are comparable to pumped hydro but it is easier to locate and build an ARES project, way easier because pumped hydro depends on water,” Cava said. “We need land and a mild grade but we have found at least 27 sites just in the state of California.”

I don’t want to say PHS, ARES, or CAES is better, Bleveans said. CAES seems to have great potential if you have the right geology. LA DWP’s Castaic PHS facility proves the right geology and topography can make that a terrific solution. And with the right conditions, an ARES project might be good, too.

"At the scale of bulk storage," Bleveans explained, “you have to be agnostic about technology because the technology has to be driven by site conditions.”